


Don't

by Yakkorat



Series: Don't [1]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, Anal Sex, Dubious Consent, Fuck Or Die, M/M, MateBonds, Oral Sex, Torture, Underage Sex, Unsafe Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-22
Updated: 2014-06-23
Packaged: 2018-02-05 17:59:01
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 19,361
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1827202
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Yakkorat/pseuds/Yakkorat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>The heart rate in the hall skyrocketed and Kate reached forward to manhandle a shivering figure into the room.</i>
</p><p> </p><p> <i>Fucking hell.  Stiles.</i></p><p> </p><p>AU of Derek’s interrogation at the hands of Kate Argent.  Spoilers through end of season 1.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Without a few absolutely wonderful people this fic would never have seen the light of day. Allow me, then, to dedicate this piece first and foremost to oldshuck, one of the most kindred spirits I have ever found, who keeps me storytelling every day, and keeps me sane when life is challenging, and to 17pansies, who lovingly prodded me to get 500 words a day written on this piece and who literally untangled the knots into which I wrote myself, to Heather, for being the most honest, amazing beta ever, even when she was much, much too busy to have taken on something like this, and to orderlychaos, who held my hand and was my greatest cheerleader through the entire editing and rewriting process, even when I wanted to give up. Honorable mention goes to [Henry](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Lyner) and Rainne, both of whom helped me through my final edits over the last few days. 
> 
> And lastly, to my beautiful Kit and Steve, the great and extraordinary loves of my life, and my incredible partners in all things. 
> 
> This story would not exist without each and every one of you, and I am so very grateful to have each of you in my life.

He had no idea how much time had passed. With the constant buzz of the current seeping through the patch of thick wires fixed to his side, he was too dizzy and disoriented to keep track. It had been long enough for the moonlight filtering through the high windows behind him to fade to sunlight. Long enough for the sunlight to crawl from one side of the dank room to the other, shining through the rusted bars to which he was chained, sending striped shadows creeping across the concrete floor. Long enough for the sun to set again, so it must have been a full day at least. Water collected in the corners of the room, the moonlight sparkling silver on its surface and splashing bright kaleidoscoping patterns on the walls. 

Derek hadn’t been down here in years. The whole place had fallen into disrepair. On the far wall the stairs still stood, but the railing had fallen. The pieces must have been cleared away, because most the floor was bare except for a few extension cords and an industrial light. The only piece of furniture had been shoved closer to the bars. When Derek was a child, his father’s desk had held a typewriter and stacks of books. Now it was home to a multi-voltage power supply. 

The thug who Kate had found to work him over was very, very good at his job. He knew exactly where to set the stream of electricity to prevent Derek’s body from healing while he worked, and before he started, he had coated his knuckles in wolfsbane powder. Even now that the flow of current had been reduced enough to permit Derek’s body to heal, Derek’s lip still stung from where her man’s fist had split it open, where traces of the wolfsbane had entered his bloodstream. It had seeped in through his pores everywhere the hunter’s blows had landed. Even such a tiny amount made Derek weaker. He could feel it coursing through him, slowing the healing process, sapping his strength.

He couldn’t afford to be this pathetic. Every second he spent trapped here was time Kate could be using to close in on Peter. Somehow, he had to get out, but it didn’t look like he was going to be able to do that on his own. Kate knew what she was doing a little too well. His best hope was that Stiles was bright enough to realize that Derek had snatched Scott’s phone and why.

Well, bright enough wasn’t really the issue. What Derek had to hope was that, when Stiles realized that Derek was missing and that he had the ability to find him, Stiles would care enough to bother trying, and Jesus. If he managed to get out of this alive Derek had to figure out what he was going to do about this. It wasn’t safe for Derek to depend on anyone, let alone a sixteen-year-old human - and yet he’d asked Stiles for help in the first moment they’d spoken to one another. He’d stepped in front of a moving vehicle trusting that Stiles - knowing he was a werewolf, suspecting that he had killed, had _murdered_ , his sister - would stop for him. He had put his life in Stiles’ hands. Repeatedly. Something had to be wrong because Derek was never this stupid.

He could almost write the whole thing off as Stiles just being in the right place at the right time – the right _several_ times – if it wasn’t for the way the kid smelled. When possible Derek’s best defense was to keep his distance because when he got too close, the scent was downright intoxicating. Something earthy and spiced, absurdly dizzying and such a terrible, terrible idea. Derek hadn’t wanted anyone so badly in a long time, and Stiles was so painfully young.

Scuffling sounded from the hallway, snapping Derek from his musing. Two sets of footsteps: Kate in her boots and another set, someone dragging his feet. He strained to hear what Kate was saying but the steel door muffled the sound. Derek closed his eyes, letting the whole of his concentration fixate on the vibration in the hallway as the two figures approached. “—as bad a girl as you think,” he caught when they got a little closer, and the creak of leather as Kate moved in her jacket. “I’m just a gal doing her job.” Then two heartbeats: Kate’s steady and calm, the other thundering. Someone wasn’t happy to be here. “Stay,” she said, louder now, loud enough to be right outside the door. “Good boy.” Something metal scraped against the wall and Derek bent his head forward trying to make it out. 

Kate shoved the door open abruptly and it clattered across the track with a roar. The sudden clamor lanced through Derek’s head like a freight train. He recoiled, blinking away the sudden pain, and when he could focus again, Kate was standing before him.

He met her eyes head on, anger already churning in his belly at the mere sight of her face. It coursed through him, helping him to straighten his back despite his exhaustion, reminding him that the shift was only a fleeting thought away.

“Well, good morning, sunshine,” she grinned. Derek said nothing. “Aw. Are you going to mope around all day?” She slid her leather jacket from her shoulders and dropped it on the desk next to his own jacket and shirt. “Francis said you were all kinds of fun to play with last night. Let’s see.” Carefully, Kate moved into his space, wary of the reach of his fangs and claws as she reached out to splay her fingers over his abdomen. 

Grinding his teeth together, Derek stiffened, refusing to shudder as revulsion hit. His family’s blood was on those chilled hands, and the feel of them against his skin was like a thousand tiny spiders swarming over his belly. Bile rose in his throat as Kate palmed her way up from his stomach over his pectoral muscle, flicking a nipple with her thumbnail before pressing it into one of the still-healing tender spots in his skin. He gasped in a little breath before he could stop himself and she smiled, pressed a little harder. When he was free he was going to slash that smug look off her murdering face. A rapid recalculation of the give in his chains was enough: she was being cautious of where she stood, where she touched. His legs tensed against the iron ankle restraints, but they were fastened too securely and there was nothing Derek could do but gnash his teeth and force himself to remain still.

“I don’t suppose you’ve decided to tell me who the alpha is,” Kate murmured, soft, as if after everything she had done he could be swayed with a few words in a sultry voice. “We could go after him together, you know. You and me.” She slid her hand over the waistband of Derek’s jeans. Slowly, she cupped his dick through the denim, the warmth of her hand soaking through the fabric and into his skin. “Just like old times.”

Derek shifted, letting his fangs drop as he surged forward. He knew it was useless but he couldn’t stop himself, the need to get her hand off him was too great. Kate danced a step farther out of reach, laughing. A few more steps and she was dialing up the current by the tiniest margin. 

Derek groaned as his muscles tightened. Shifting back, forcing the claws back into his fingertips and his fangs to contract helped a little, but he couldn’t take a decent breath until she twisted the knob back to the setting it had been left it on while she was gone.

“You’re still fun to play with,” Kate said, pleased. “Feisty. Oh, the things I could do with you.”

“I don’t want anything from you,” he spat through his teeth. “Not ever.”

“Oh, Derek,” she crooned. “Don’t ever say never.” She laughed at him when he snarled. “You’re so sure you’re never going to breathe a word to me. But you forget, kiddo. I know you.” 

Like hell she did, Derek thought grimly. She’d known a sixteen-year-old idiot who had been stupid enough to trust her and had gotten his family killed for his trouble. He bore no resemblance to the person Derek was now. 

“I got you a little surprise.” She walked toward the door and a wave of ice cold dread broke over him.

As soon as the sliding panel rattled open the scent hit Derek like a cement truck. Panic. Sheer, absolute terror, and lying underneath it something vaguely familiar. The heart rate in the hall skyrocketed and Kate reached forward to manhandle a shivering figure into the room.

Derek’s stomach dropped to his knees. Fucking hell. Stiles. What was he doing here? It was a good thing no one could hear Derek’s heart beating because within an instant it matched Stiles’ rapid cadence. What kind of game was Kate playing? Dragging Stiles into this made no sense. Unless she knew how Derek—

No. No way Kate knew. Derek had barely come to terms with this ridiculous attraction himself, let alone decided what to do with it. If anything. 

Derek stared at the massive bruise shining high on Stiles’ cheekbone and couldn’t keep the growl from thundering deep in his chest. She’d hurt him. The flash of rage was so immediate, so consuming that it took his breath away. 

Stiles was gagged, his lips stretched around cloth bunched thick in his mouth. His hands were bound behind his back, a dog’s choke collar around his neck and the attached leash wrapped tight around Kate’s fist. “Found a puppy out there all alone,” she said.

Stiles’ wide eyes found Derek’s and his frantic heartbeat slowed a little. Stiles was relieved to see him. What had Derek done to earn that kind of trust?

“I barely know this kid,” Derek said.

“Oh, I don’t think that’s true,” Kate said. “You seemed awfully friendly together riding around in his Jeep.”

Fuck. The night they’d found out about Peter. Stiles had skipped out on his one chance to get off the bench and actually play in his game to help Derek. “You were following us.”

“I was going to the grocery store. I just happened to see you in this little shit’s car and turned around. I’d like to say I’m that good, but sometimes you just get lucky.”

She thought they were friends. Giving Kate the slightest indication that Stiles meant anything more to him would be like chumming the water. Derek forced his racing heart to slow. “So you grab my chauffeur and expect me to just roll over and tell you everything?” He dredged up a sneer from somewhere and avoided looking anywhere near Stiles’ face. “I thought you were better than that.”

She answered with a smirk of her own. “Look at the big bad wolf,” she said to Stiles, “pretending not to give a shit.” 

Derek shrugged. “He’s just a kid. Why would I care about him?” 

“Why would you care about anybody?” she countered. “I thought I trained you better than that.” Derek had thought so, too. This whatever-it-was with Stiles had taken him completely by surprise. He suppressed a shudder and kept his mouth shut. “But this one?” Kate grinned, grabbing Stiles’ chin, squeezing his cheeks between her fingers. “Aww, sweetie, this one is just too much. All soft and sweet.”

And young, Derek’s mind added unhelpfully. Young and brave and loyal and too kind and if she didn’t get her hands off of him Derek was going to—

“The things I could do with _him_.” His low growl was so instinctive it caught Derek by surprise. He swallowed it back and glared. “Since you’re so friendly,” Kate prompted, dropping her chin to Stiles’ shoulder, “maybe _you_ know who the alpha is.” Crooking a finger over the gag, she tugged the rag from Stiles’ mouth. “Come on, kid. Bet you’re the life of the party. Talk to me.”

Stiles took a deep breath. Even from four feet away, Derek could see it shaking in his chest. “You may regret that,” Stiles prevaricated. “Do you know how much time people spend trying to get me to shut up?”

A sharp tug on the leash, and the links closed tighter around Stiles’ neck. “Hey!” he squeaked. “You want me to talk or you want me to shut up? Make up your mind. Which is it?”

Kate pulled the collar a little tighter, and Stiles’ heart jackrabbited to a terrified rhythm. He was going to tell her. Derek scowled at Stiles, trying to convey with his eyes what he couldn’t say aloud: it’s not what you think. Peter isn’t the enemy. Don’t tell her anything. It didn’t seem to matter; Stiles never even glanced at him.

“Why would I know that?” Stiles gasped when she loosened her hold. His voice shook, his heart skipping over the not-quite lie. “How would I know that?”

“Oh, cutie,” Kate purred into Stiles’ ear, “you’d be surprised what people pick up just by keeping their eyes open around here. That’s how I found out about you, after all.” She smoothed a hand down Stiles’ arm and smiled wolfishly when he shivered. Derek clenched his fists until his blunt, human nails dug crescents into his palms. “And what a delicious morsel that turned out to be.” 

“Even if I knew,” Stiles said, breathing in deeply and managing to keep his voice steady though Derek could hear his heart pounding, “why would I tell you?”

“Everybody’s got something to lose. Some things are just a little more precious than others.” She leaned closer to Stiles and planted a kiss on his cheek. “How’s your mom, kid?” Stiles flinched. Nausea churned in Derek’s gut and he just barely kept his growl behind his teeth. Stiles wasn’t family, wasn’t pack. No matter how many times Derek told himself he knew better than to get invested, knew better than to put himself on the line for someone who had no reason to do the same for him, inexplicably, with this kid he barely knew, that was exactly what he had done. “Oh, that’s right,” Kate crowed, her cold eyes all for Derek. “She’s dead. It’s tough losing people you’re close to. Derek would know, wouldn’t you, sweetie?”

The pain of losing his family was a constant, dull ache, an old wound that would never heal, but it was nothing compared to this, to watching the face from his nightmares toying with Stiles like a cat with a mouse. 

“It’s a terrible thing to lose a mother,” Kate continued, stroking a finger down Stiles’ cheek, pressing into the bruise until he winced. “It would be a damned tragedy to lose your dad.”

Stiles whipped his head around to look at her. “You stay the fuck away from my father.”

Kate sighed, her expression dripping with false sympathy. “I’d like to, kid. I’d really like to, but I have a responsibility to protect the humans in this town. Not just one or two, but all of them. And for that, I need to know who my target is.” 

“Because you’re such a _noble_ psychotic bitch.”

She laughed, seemingly delighted with his reply. “Think about it for a second. You don’t really need this complication in your life, do you?” She pressed her cheek against his so that they were looking at Derek together. “Look at him. Is he worth all this? Why not tell me what I want to know? You can go on with your life and go fishing or whatever with dear old dad, and Derek? Well, Derek and I have a little unfinished business we need to take care of, but we can do that just between the two of us.”

“I’m not going to sell Derek out to save my father.” 

Having known Stiles for so long, his reflexive refusal shouldn’t have been a surprise to Derek, but somehow it was. Derek knew Kate too well to believe she wouldn’t follow through on any threat she made. She would kill Stiles’ father without so much as a twinge of conscience. Derek couldn’t ask Stiles to protect Peter at the risk of the sheriff’s life. Peter was an alpha. He’d have to take his chances. But Stiles wasn’t going to make him. It could cost Stiles the only family he had left, but he wasn’t going to tell Kate what she wanted to know. Derek swallowed, hard. “You should,” he said quietly.

“No!” Stiles glared at Derek. “She doesn’t get to pin her crazy on me. I’m not going to choose.”

Both of Kate’s brows rose. She must have been impressed. “I think he actually means it.”

Stiles nodded, his expression fierce. “Damned right I do.”

The look she gave him was almost fond. “You sure know how to pick ‘em, don’t you?” she smiled at Derek.

“I didn’t—” Derek began, but Kate cut him off.

“You see, the thing is: I know you, sweetie. I know you try really hard not to care about anyone because if you let someone get close to you it hurts like a bitch when they leave. And we all leave, one way or another, don’t we, Derek?”

Derek clenched his jaw and said nothing. There was no point in denying it. She knew she was right. He did understand what it was like to lose everyone, what it was like to be the only one left.

Kate feigned a yawn. “Okay, bored now. I think it’s time we put our toys away, don’t you?” Without warning she pulled hard on the leash. Stiles stumbled and Derek’s animal instinct gave a little cry of terror, but he bit it back viciously. This wasn’t the time. 

High on the wall by the desk there were several heavy metal hooks driven deep into the stone. Kate pushed Stiles against the wall and slipped the large outer ring of the collar, the one through which the rest of the chain links moved, over one. It was low enough that Stiles didn’t have to stand on his toes, but even half a step away from the wall would pull the chain taut around his throat.

“Now,” she said, taking a pair of thick rubber gloves from the desk, “let’s have some fun.”

Kate twisted the dial, turning the current up and sending it streaming through Derek’s body, white hot and searing, as his every muscle seized at once. The world fell away, the shock lancing up his spine, driving into the base of his skull, shrinking his skin until he couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe, couldn’t _see_. His vision went black. It was the highest setting she’d used yet, and Derek was peeling off in layers until there was nothing left but the raw bite of pain and the sound of howling deep inside his mind as he fought for breath. No. Not howling. Over the blood rushing through his ears, there was a voice screaming in the darkness.

“—op it! Jesus, _stop_ it! What the fuck do you want, you crazy bitch?!”

_Stiles_. Stiles was screaming. The current bowed Derek’s back, his neck angling sharply against the surface behind it. Bitter copper flooded his mouth, the burn crackling like lightning trapped beneath his skin.

“Turn it off,” Stiles pleaded. “I don’t know anything! You sadistic bitch, _turn it off_!”

And she did. She must have. One second Derek’s body was contorted, warping itself in a futile effort to escape the scalding heat, and the next his back was dropping to the grit-covered floor with a thud that pressed a groan out through his teeth. The impact knocked what little air he’d had from his chest and for a few seconds he could do nothing but lie there twitching, dragging breath into his fiery lungs. 

When he opened his eyes the ceiling above him was dimly lit and dirt covered. She must have moved him while the current was dialed up. Jesus, the shackles had been off and he hadn’t been able to do anything. 

A new position meant the new possibility of finding exploitable weaknesses, a new chance of stopping Kate from hurting Stiles more than she already had. Derek would get right on that, just as soon as he could convince his body to move.

“Derek?” Stiles croaked, and Derek blinked up at him, his head too heavy to lift from the ground. Stiles was still strung up by the collar against the wall, but he strained forward toward Derek. The metal links bit cruelly into the flesh at Stiles’ throat, thinning his breath, turning his face a deep red. 

“M’fine,” Derek managed, and Stiles nodded a little bit manically and leaned back enough to take some of the pressure from his bruised larynx. 

Kate clapped lazily. “You two are _adorable_.” She kicked at Derek’s ankle. “How did you ever convince someone so goody-two-shoes that you were worth his time?”

“Derek is worth a thousand of you,” Stiles spat angrily, the venom in his voice unmistakable despite the rasp. “He's everything you're not and so much more than you could ever hope to be.” 

Kate sauntered the few feet over to Stiles and Derek’s breath caught in his throat. “You know,” she said, “I’ve always believed the adage that children should be seen...” Without warning she buried her fist in Stiles’ abdomen. “Not heard.” 

Stiles groaned and tried to double over. The movement pulled the chain tighter around his neck, and his eyes widened as he choked, struggling to right himself and gain enough slack to breathe. 

Desperate to reach him, to help, to do _something_ , Derek strained against the shackles, grinding his teeth together until his jaw ached. “Oh, calm down,” Kate grinned down at him. “I’m not going to kill him. Not yet, anyway.” She planted a hand on Stiles' chest and unceremoniously shoved him back against the wall, slipping a finger inside the chain to loosen it while Stiles wheezed and coughed.

The shift rippled just below the surface, aching to burst through, but Derek fought it back with every drop of his will. It wouldn’t help him, not yet, and he had no idea what Kate would do to Stiles if he tried. Her eyes narrowed as she watched him swallow back the change, waited until he had regained control. Then her smile turned smug, sly, her fingers lingering on Stiles’ chest.

“You want to kill me, don’t you?” she asked, her voice low. “And not because of what I did to your family or even what I’m doing to you now.” Kate’s hand wandered lower and slipped under the hem of Stiles’ T-shirt, her eyes never leaving Derek’s as her finger slid flat along Stiles’ abdomen and then up where Derek couldn’t see. Whatever she did was enough to make Stiles suck in a terrified breath and set his body shaking, and Derek couldn’t hold back the growl in his chest. Kate raised an eyebrow, entirely too pleased with herself. “You want to kill me because I’m touching him. This skinny pimple-faced kid got under your skin, didn’t he?”

“He’s a friend,” Derek gritted through clenched teeth, carefully keeping his expression blank though his heart was nearly pounding out of his chest. He knew Kate, knew the way her twisted mind worked, knew the vile little smirk that meant she’d just had what she thought was a fabulous idea. Whatever trouble they had been in up to this point, it was about to get a whole lot worse.

“A friend?” Her eyes widened as she crouched down beside Derek, just out of range. “You don’t have many of those. Well, it would be cruel of me to deprive you of one another.” She laid a hand on Derek’s chest and let it drift to squeeze at his bicep. He recoiled away from her, the back of his shoulders scratching along the grimy floor before he could stop himself. “You know, I had planned on us having a little reunion, but I think you may actually be spoken for. Of course, that doesn’t mean I can’t enjoy a little,” she paused, her eyebrows waggling, “entertainment.”

It took a second for her meaning to become clear, and when the penny dropped, the trepidation swirling in Derek’s stomach blossomed nauseatingly into horror.

“Listen, lady,” Stiles croaked, and maybe he didn’t get what Kate was about to demand of him. “I don’t sing, I don’t juggle, and my ballet’s a little rusty.”

“He’s a riot,” Kate smirked. “Is that why you like him?”

Derek ignored her. “You can't do this,” he tried to reason with her as she stood. “He's not part of this. He’s human.” He was human and fragile, and Kate had utterly destroyed Derek’s life at sixteen. He couldn’t let her do the same to Stiles.

“He is human,” Kate agreed. “He's cute, too. Not exactly the kind of sixteen-year-old boy I’d go for, but hey, you knew that already. And there’s no accounting for taste.” She reached up and slipped the ring of the choke chain from the hook on the wall, wrapping the leash around her hand. With a quick jerk of the chain she brought Stiles stumbling against her. She flipped him around so he was facing Derek and fit herself behind his body, leaning in to nuzzle the patch of skin behind his ear. “Mmm,” she murmured. “He smells good. Even to me.”

Derek ground his teeth together, ruthlessly holding his roaring instincts in check. “He’s just a kid,” he said slowly. “And he has nothing to do with this.”

“Oh, buddy-boy,” Kate said, eyebrows raised. “I didn’t bring him into this.” She looked Derek square in the eyes. “You did.” And she was right. Goddammit, what had he been thinking, showing up in Stiles’ bedroom like a stalker? This entire mess was his fault in every conceivable way. 

“I seem to recall you didn’t have any objections to a little extracurricular activity in high school,” Kate said, feigning confusion but managing somehow to look insufferably smug at the same time. “Miss those days?”

“We weren’t at gunpoint,” Derek reminded her.

“ _You_ were,” Kate countered. “You just didn’t know it.”

Derek swallowed, striving to keep six years of guilt from parading across his face. Not that it mattered. Kate didn’t need to see it to know that it was there, but Derek wasn’t going to give her the satisfaction. He glanced at Stiles, so young, with his whole life ahead of him the way Derek’s life had been, and saw it all happening again. Kate would bring Stiles’ future crashing down around his shoulders just as she’d done to Derek, like déjà vu from hell, unless he could think of something - anything - that could derail this train wreck before it happened.

“Now,” Kate said, turning to Stiles, and Derek found himself holding his breath, “this is what you’re going to do.”

“I’m not going to help you hurt him,” Stiles interrupted. His voice was jagged, but solid steel underneath.

“Oh, honey,” Kate said patronizingly, “I think you are. Or, more likely, he’s going to hurt you. He always did like it a little rough.”

“Wait. Are you... Are you saying you and he...” His eyes flicked between Derek and Kate. “Wait,” he said again. Derek’s stomach clenched. At the speed Stiles’ mind worked it wouldn’t take long. Derek would have given his right arm for Stiles not to have had to put these thoughts together. Suddenly, Stiles’ eyes widened and his jaw dropped. “Are you saying you want me and him to... Because that’s, like, insane. You know that, right?” He shot a desperate glance down at Derek. “Tell her, Derek. Tell her how much that is _not happening_.”

“Go ahead, Derek,” Kate said, challenging. She tugged hard on the leash, forcing Stiles’ head back practically onto Kate’s shoulder behind him. “Tell me I'm not going to get what I want.” She ran her fingers lightly over Stiles’ cheek. “His father is a sheriff. Big strong man like that? He knows how to protect himself. There's no way I could get to him, right? Go on,” she said again, her fingers drifting around to the back of Stiles’ neck and down out of view. “Look at your boy and tell him everything is going to be okay."

Derek glared at her. At this precise moment there was nothing in the world he wanted more than the ability to speak those words and make them true. If he were free he could snap her neck as easily as a dry twig. But he wasn’t. 

He dared a glance at Stiles; when their eyes met, Derek’s breath caught in his chest. For a second, time stopped as he lay there, staring, and in that frozen moment he was struck with the realization that this wasn’t a child looking back. This was a young man, one who knew what he was up against, who knew how potentially screwed they were, and who wasn’t going to go down without a fight. Sometimes Derek forgot that under all the hyperactivity, Stiles was iron at his core. He didn’t back down, not even when he should. 

"I may be sixteen, but I'm way past the age of fairytales, lady. I don't need a bedtime story, thanks all the same. Threaten me all you want, but you can't make me do this."

Kate grinned. “Watch me.” Her fingers danced along the dials, setting them where she wanted. Derek took a deep breath and tried to brace himself.

“He’s no good to you dead,” Stiles said as she reached for the “on” switch. “You’re going to kill him!”

“I really don’t know why you care.” Kate shrugged, her finger on the button. “At the end of the day, he’s not human. He’s a monster.”

“Yeah?” Stiles snapped. “He’s a werewolf. What’s your excuse?”

Kate raised a single brow, and then she flipped the switch.

The crushing press of electricity was everywhere. Derek’s muscles contracted, closing his throat, twisting his back into sharp angles, and squeezing the breath from his lungs. Time slowed to a crawl. It was eternal, this grasping, wrenching compression, like his entire body was held in a vice that someone was tightening slowly, one single turn of the handle at a time.

Outside the fog of pain and disorientation there was nothing, there could be nothing, because this shrouding black agony was so much that it had to be everything. Except it wasn’t. Something more was at stake, something vitally important, and Derek fought through the confusion clouding his mind until, as if it were very far away, he heard a voice cry out in desperation.

“All right, damn you, I’ll do it!”

Finally the current stopped. Tiny rivulets of electricity danced across his muscles, triggering the odd movement or twitch as the shocks dissipated. As he fought, gasping, for air, Derek tried to think, to focus through the swirling miasma in his head. Somehow this was very, very bad. He dropped his head onto the floor and concentrated on breathing until his heart stopped trying to claw its way through his chest and slowed to a manageable pace. When his thoughts cleared, when he could feel the cold concrete beneath his skin and the heavy chains around his wrists and remember where he was, and with whom, and what Stiles’ capitulation meant to them both, Derek opened his eyes with dread. Kate’s smile was rancid, as if something inside of her had rotted away. How had there ever been a time when he couldn’t see that?

Derek glowered up at her. She still had the leash pulled taut, the chain of the collar barely allowing Stiles to breathe. There were tears on his face, but he wasn’t crying, just looking down on Derek with fear. Not fear for himself, Derek realized with a shock, but fear for _him_. For _Derek_.

“I knew you’d see reason,” Kate murmured into Stiles’ ear, and then she took the very tip of it between her teeth. Stiles flinched as if she’d struck him, and Derek growled low in his throat. He dragged his wrists against the manacles but he was too exhausted, too weak, and the chains were so damned heavy.

“What makes you think that I am going to go along with it?” he tried to demand, but there was no strength in his voice.

“Because if you don’t, I’m going to shoot him.”

“Just for the record,” Stiles interjected, “I would really, really appreciate not getting shot.”

Kate rested her chin on his shoulder again. “Then you should have picked your friends a little better,” she suggested. “Besides, you can’t tell me you haven’t had impure thoughts about Derek, here. Just look at those rippling muscles,” she taunted. “Those washboard abs. He looks like he just stepped off Mount Olympus, and you? Well, you’re you. But you’ve looked, right, Stiles?” She leaned in close and whispered in Stiles’ ear, her voice velvety smooth and dancing the edge of menace. “You’ve wanted to touch, haven’t you?” Stiles' breath caught in his chest, and for a second, he didn’t move. Impatient for her answer, Kate shook him hard. “Haven’t you?” 

Stiles swallowed, then exhaled slowly. Setting his jaw, he visibly braced himself before he raised his chin to meet Derek’s eyes. “Yes,” he said quietly, his voice low and unwavering. “I wanted to touch.” His heartbeat was rock steady. Derek felt his brows draw together and his own pulse ratchet up a notch. If Stiles returned his interest, it was news to Derek. He had never conceived, had never even entertained the possibility that this unspeakably brave, headstrong young man could want him. What did he in all his darkness have to offer someone so filled with light? He couldn’t protect him. Hell, Derek couldn’t even protect himself.

Kate’s slender hand slid over Stiles’ shoulder and down his chest, palming its way over the waistband of his jeans and cupping his dick firmly while his heart accelerated to the speed of a hummingbird’s. “See, Derek? Kid’s got it bad for you.” The sour smell of fear intensified in the air. It crawled under Derek’s skin, a thousand tiny fire ants marching through his veins. She needed to get her hands off him. Right now.

“Hmm,” Kate widened her eyes, tightening her fingers around the bulge in Stiles’ jeans. “You know, Derek, maybe he doesn’t want you as much as he said.”

“Maybe I get performance anxiety,” Stiles tried to quip. His voice broke, but it didn’t stop him. “Hands off the merchandise. This is full on child molestation territory here.” Kate flexed her fist, squeezing, and Stiles’ breath hitched with pain. His body cringed away from her touch, seeming to rebel against the very idea of her hands on him, and for the first time, a small whimper escaped his throat. Something cracked, splintering in Derek's chest at that helpless sound, responding instinctively to Stiles’ terror and disgust with the need to protect, to eliminate the threat, to tear Kate into so many pieces they would never find them all. He tugged viciously at his bonds, snarling. Derek was the one she wanted, damn it, if he could just get her attention away from Stiles and onto him where it belonged.

“Hey,” Kate chided sharply. “None of that.” She kicked Derek’s leg with the steel toe of her boot; he kicked back but she spun away, pulling Stiles with her. “You behave,” she warned. “Your actions have consequences, you know.” She tugged hard on the chain around Stiles’ neck and his eyes went wide with panic, his breath wheezing as he struggled for air.

“All right,” Derek snapped, frantic. “All right, you win.” Carefully, he let his arms go lax, ceasing his struggle against the manacles and dropping his wrists to the floor. The chains clanged heavily against the concrete. “Whatever you want.”

Kate’s grin spread slowly. “There’s a good boy.” She let go of the leash and Stiles wobbled, his knees buckling as he gulped in oxygen. Kate’s arm around his chest tightened, holding his body to hers even as his legs shook. She only gave him a few seconds to catch his breath before she moved closer to the desk, dragging him in her wake until she could reach into her jacket and pull out a handgun. “Let’s get started.” She smiled again and released her hold on him.

Instantly wary, Stiles stepped a few paces away, his eyes caught on the weapon. Kate stalked towards him, her movements lithe, predatory. Stiles shrank back a step, and then another as she advanced, until his back hit the bars to which Derek had been originally chained and Stiles had nowhere left to go. Jabbing the gun up under Stiles’ chin, Kate moved in close, pressing herself against his trembling body and wrapping her free arm around him. The tepid stench of fear bled through the room again as she breathed into his ear, “Let’s see what you’re hiding under all those layers.”

“Leave him alone,” Derek snarled, his hands clenching into fists, but then he heard the telltale click of a catch releasing. Stiles stood stock still, barely breathing. There was a second click. Kate stepped away with the gun aimed directly at Stiles’ heart and the pair of handcuffs hanging from one finger. 

“Strip,” she ordered.

Stiles glanced nervously down at Derek and then back. “Shouldn’t there be a fog machine and some colored lights or something?”

Kate’s brows raised. “Funny.”

“Some music at the very least. Why don’t I go run and get my iPod out of the Jeep?”

“Why don’t I put a bullet in Derek’s kneecap if you make me ask again?”

Stiles swallowed, shot another fleeting look down at Derek. One by one, he toed off his shoes, pulling his socks off and stuffing them into one sneaker. “Just like the locker room, right?” he scoffed, and stripped off his plaid button down, tossing it onto the desk, looking everywhere, anywhere other than Derek, or Kate, or the gun in her hand. He reached for the metal links around his neck next, but Kate made a shooing motion with the weapon.

“Leave the collar on.” She smirked, pulling out the desk chair and sitting down. “It’s a good look for you.”

The muscle tightened in Stiles’ jaw, and Derek felt his own eyes flash in sympathy and rage. “Fine,” Stiles ground out. He yanked his arms from the sleeves of his T-shirt and dragged it over his head, threading the leash through the opening at the neck and hurling the shirt to the desk as well. He hesitated for a second with his hands on the waistband of his jeans, his fingers trembling though he was squeezing them tightly around the denim. For the briefest instant, so quickly that without his preternatural senses Derek might have missed it, Stiles’ eyes met his. Then Stiles pushed hard and shoved the pants and boxers over his hips in one movement. “What now?” he asked, stepping out of the jeans and throwing them on top of the rest of his clothes.

“Geez, you really are new to this.” Kate waved the gun towards Derek. “Now him.”

“Right,” Stiles grumbled. “Because he’s not going to kill me the minute I get close.”

Kate raised the gun again and gave it a little wiggle. “I’ll kill you if you don’t.”

Stiles breathed in deep, but it didn’t stop his heart from racing. He was going to give himself an aneurism if he didn’t calm down. “I’m not going to kill you, Stiles,” Derek promised. “Just do what she says.”

Stiles nodded. “Okay,” he said. He knelt by Derek’s torso and reached forward, pausing with his hands on the button of Derek’s jeans, his fingers barely brushing Derek’s stomach. Derek’s breath did a funny little catch in his throat at the touch, and then Stiles stopped. He pressed his lips together. Closed his eyes. Took a breath.

“I know you want to hurt him,” Stiles said, his voice low, his eyes still closed against whatever cruelty Kate was likely to inflict, “and I don’t know why you think I’m the best way to do that.” Stiles turned to face Kate. From where he knelt he was only inches from the barrel of the gun; he flinched away from the weapon but he didn’t stop. “Please,” he said quietly, his voice trembling. “Please don’t make me do this to him.” 

For an instant, all the air went out of the room and Derek couldn’t breathe. If he lived another thousand years the image would still be seared into his brain: Stiles Stilinski, a kid who owed him nothing, who asked nothing from him, naked on his knees between Derek and harm. In all his life, he had never seen anything so brave, and Derek hated himself just a little for being the leverage that brought Stiles to this.

Kate leaned forward, her elbows on her knees, looming over Stiles. “Now you listen, _Stiles,_ ” she jeered, reaching out to let the barrel of the gun caress past his cheek and behind his ear. “If you don't do this to him, I'm going to do it to you, and I’m going to use this.” She traced the tip of the gun down his neck. Stiles’ entire body shuddered, but he didn’t back down, glaring at her. Derek didn’t dare to even breathe. “How does that sound?” 

When he answered, Stiles’ voice was low but sure. “I’d rather have his hands on me than yours.”

“Huh,” she said, and then struck him with the grip of the pistol. Derek’s claws bit into his palms but he forced them back. Stiles nearly fell sideways off his knees, but he managed to right himself and clutch a hand to his cheek, every muscle tight, as if he were keeping himself from striking back through sheer force of will. 

“So ungrateful,” Kate sneered. “I’m doing you a favor, sweetie.” She sat back and waved the gun at him. “Pants. Off. Now.”

Slowly, Stiles turned back to Derek, his already-bruised cheekbone glistening with blood. For just a moment, he looked every inch the sixteen-year-old boy he was. Then he blinked, and the boy was gone again. In his place, the courageous young man Derek was gradually coming to know knelt instead. Stiles remained still for a few seconds more, the cold tips of his fingers touching Derek’s skin above the waistline of his jeans. He brought his eyes to Derek’s and Derek gave a short nod before Stiles slowly slipped the top button through the hole.

“I assume you didn’t think to provide the necessities,” Derek accused, mostly to try to make the moment less awkward for Stiles and not at all because it helped him ignore Stiles’ soft knuckles sliding along his hips as he tugged Derek’s jeans free.

Kate guffawed. “What for? You can’t carry anything. You can’t get sick, and no one is exactly at risk of getting knocked up here.” 

“That’s not the only thing we’ll need.”

“This wasn’t my original plan, sweetie, remember? Call it spur of the moment. I live to improvise.” She smiled wide, and it was a sick, wasted thing without pity. “You’ll manage,” she said. “You’ll have to.”

Derek watched the fear in Stiles’ eyes and forced himself to think rationally. There was only one way they could get through this with a minimum of damage, and though his instincts rankled at the thought, Derek knew what he had to do.

Breathing in deeply, he met Stiles’ eyes. “You have to do it.”

“What?!” 

“Derek, you _dog_!” Kate exclaimed, positively brimming with glee.

Derek ignored her. “Stiles,” he said intently, “you have to do it.”

“I— I can't,” Stiles stammered. “I can't. I have no idea what I'm doing. I'll hurt you.”

“We have nothing to use,” Derek said, keeping his voice even. “We’re on the ground in a filthy cellar. It's going to hurt. She wants it to. But look at me.” Stiles bit the inside of his lip hard enough to draw blood; Derek could smell the coppery tang as soon as it hit the air. “Stiles, look at me,” Derek said again, and waited until Stiles could muster the courage to meet his eyes. “I'll heal.”

Stiles nodded jerkily and knelt between Derek’s legs, his eyes darting around the room, looking anywhere but at Derek’s dick. His gaze fell on the makeshift patch fixed to Derek’s side and his lips pressed together. Stiles reached for the mess of wiring but before his hand could make contact, Kate cleared her throat.

“Touch that and I shoot.”

Stiles’s eyes narrowed as he scowled. Then he let his eyes fall closed, blinking slowly as he breathed in deep. When his eyes opened again there was a world of apology in them, but he obeyed Kate, carefully lifting his hands away. “What do you want me to do?”

Kate crossed her legs lazily. “You’re a big boy. You’ll figure it out.”

Stiles shifted his gaze back to Derek. “I don’t,” he started, stopped, started again. “I don’t really know what to do here. I mean, I don’t even know if I can.”

Everywhere their skin touched Derek could feel Stiles trembling. He was terrified, but he was hiding it well. 

“You can do this,” Derek said firmly. “I’ll talk you through it, okay?”

Stiles took a deep breath that quivered a little in his chest, and glanced down. “Okay,” he said. “But you’re going to have to actually tell me what to do.”

“Start with one finger. Slowly,” Derek cautioned. “As wet as you can get it, and a little at a time.”

Obligingly, Stiles popped a finger into his mouth. That just wasn’t— Watching Stiles sucking on his finger was fucking pornographic. He wasn’t trying to be sexy; he was just being... thorough, but Jesus, could this get any more fucked up? A sliver of arousal rocketed through Derek and ruthlessly he stamped it down.

When Stiles took his finger from his mouth, he hesitated, uncertain. Derek spread his legs a little more, rested his head on the floor, and nodded. Stiles wasn’t the most coordinated of people at the best of times, so Derek took a deep breath and braced himself for the first touch. When it came, though, it was so gentle it was barely there. Stiles’ fingers were long and slender, and he worked the first one in at a glacial pace, nudging the walls of Derek’s passage to open him up a little more before sliding in any deeper. 

“Like this?” Stiles asked, his face a mask of intense concentration.

“Yeah,” Derek breathed. “That’s good. Now pull it slowly out, and then ease back in with two.”

Stiles stretched him gently, so carefully, as if he was something infinitely precious. Two fingers, and then three when Derek insisted, though the dry burn was intense. Fuck it. He’d been through worse. 

Finally, it felt like enough. Derek caught Stiles’ eyes and nodded. “I’m ready.”

Stiles gave an embarrassed wave toward his dick. “Well, I’m not.”

For the first time, Derek allowed himself to look away from Stiles’ face. Fear and cold had taken their toll, and Stiles was nowhere near where they needed him to be for this to work. Derek had to make it work. The alternative, to rob Stiles of any more than this was already going to take from him, was unthinkable.

Stiles followed the direction of Derek’s stare and blushed. “Hey! It’s freezing down here!”

If the circumstances had been anything but what they were, Derek would have laughed. Instead, he lifted his head to catch Stiles’ eyes. “Come here,” he said.

“Come...” Stiles’ blush spread down to his knees. “You can’t be asking what I think you’re asking.”

“Get over here, Stiles.” Derek rattled his chains. “I can’t exactly come to you.”

Scrambling to his feet, Stiles walked the few steps over and Derek tipped his head in invitation. Stiles smiled, embarrassed. Awkwardly, he knelt with one knee on either side of Derek’s head. Their eyes met again, but it was too much, too intimate given what he was about to do and Derek turned his gaze away and focused on his task instead.

Even unaroused, Stiles let out a little squeak when Derek’s lips closed around him. Stiles was sitting too far back and the distance meant that Derek had to reach for it, had to lift his head from the floor and hold it at an awkward angle. Noticing almost immediately, Stiles shuffled forward to make it easier on him.

Derek wasn’t exactly Don Juan. Not that he was a virgin or anything - he’d had a few spectacular wolfsbane-and-vodka hangovers in New York and he hadn’t been too picky about who he spent the nights before them with, but his life hadn’t exactly been an episode of “The Bachelor,” what with being a werewolf and then having his entire family slaughtered by the crazed bitch with the— No. Better to steer clear of those thoughts with Stiles’ dick in his mouth. Wouldn’t want to lose his temper and shift. The point was that even though he wasn’t the most experienced guy in the world, he’d had a Tom, Dick, and probably a Harry in his years; he knew what he was doing with a cock in his mouth. It didn’t seem to matter. Stiles wasn’t responding. At all. Whatever strawberry blond fantasy was rolling around in that fuzzy head of his clearly wasn’t doing it for him.

The safety clicking off the gun was deafening in the quiet. “I don’t have all night, boys. Get on with it.”

Stiles opened his eyes. Brows furrowing, he looked down at Derek, studying him as if he were the greatest puzzle of Stiles’ life. Then Stiles closed his eyes, tipped his head back, and within seconds his heartbeat started to accelerate.

As the flesh in his mouth began to fill, the scent of Stiles’ arousal crashed over Derek like a tidal wave. He’d never smelled anything like it in his life: forest and wind and star anise and clove. Saliva filled his mouth as he used his tongue to explore the deeper flavor in the creases of Stiles’ skin. He swallowed the extra moisture and Stiles moaned above him, the sound reverberating in Stiles’ exposed throat. Jesus. That long expanse of pale, porcelain skin, _bared_ for him. Suddenly desperate to be able to touch, Derek tensed, his wrists pulling against the shackles. The metal held fast, but Stiles seemed to sense his need and reached forward, tangling his long fingers through Derek’s. The instant their palms met it soothed something in Derek, something buried deep and frayed raw so long ago he hadn’t even known it was ragged until Stiles’ touch smoothed the edges. He curled his fingers around Stiles’ hands and sucked gently at the erection growing ever prouder between his lips. Stiles trembled, his weight falling forward onto Derek’s palms.

“Jesus,” Stiles whispered. “How did you get so good at this?” Derek just ran the tip of his tongue along the vein on the underside of Stiles’ dick. Stiles made a sound that was nearly a sob. “Derek, you have to stop.” But Derek didn’t want to stop. He wanted to bring Stiles screaming over that crest, to see if he tasted as spicy as he smelled. “Derek,” Stiles hissed a little desperately, “you have to stop or I won’t be able to do this!”

All the heat, the burning conflagration buffeting Derek’s every sense turned to lead in his stomach in an instant. They weren’t making love. What the hell was wrong with him? Stiles was sixteen. He was sixteen, and he was being forced to sleep with Derek by the same person who just a few years ago had used Derek, and sex, and being sixteen, to destroy everything that Derek had ever loved. No matter what Stiles had said about impure thoughts earlier, he wasn’t consenting here. He couldn’t be, not with Kate, and her gun, and her all-too-credible threat against the sheriff's life. Regardless of how badly Derek - and he couldn’t lie to himself, not now, not after the way he had reacted to Stiles’ scent - might want to savor the velvet weight of Stiles’ cock on his tongue, there was no part of taking pleasure in any of this that was okay. Derek eased his mouth gently from Stiles’ body and watched Stiles tighten a fist around the base of his erection, squeezing his eyes closed just as tightly. Stiles stayed frozen for a full minute, his eyes shut, just breathing, and the slight slowing of his heartbeat echoed in Derek’s ears as if it were the most important sound in the world.

When Stiles seemed to have control of himself he lifted a leg over Derek’s head, barely avoiding kicking him in the nose, and walked back to lower himself to the floor between Derek’s knees. He sat back on his heels, ran a nervous hand up and down Derek’s thigh, and shot Derek the least believable smile ever.

“Count yourself lucky, kid,” Kate drawled from her chair. “Derek is pretty wild in the sack.”

Derek hadn’t exactly forgotten that Kate was there, but hearing her voice was like being doused in freezing water. His every muscle tensed, his hands reaching reflexively to comfort Stiles but succeeding only in rattling the heavy chain.

Stiles’ body tightened, his erection still standing proud but his teeth clenched, his eyes blazing. “Hey, lady? Don’t you have a registered sex offender list you should be signing up for?”

Kate just laughed. “I’ve got to hand it to you, Derek. He’s got spunk. No wonder you like him.”

Stiles actually growled. Then he turned away from Kate. He crawled forward, stretching his body over Derek’s in one long, slender line of heat, his throbbing dick leaving a thin trail of fluid over Derek’s abdomen, his elbow whispering over a taut nipple, his thigh nesting into the crux of Derek’s legs, until Stiles’ face was all Derek could see. “Hey,” Stiles breathed, so quietly Derek knew he was the only one who could hear. Stiles’ breath was warm and wet, ghosting across his lips, and it smelled like heaven. “Listen. She’s not here,” he whispered, his eyes boring into Derek’s. “It’s only me. And we’re going to do this, and it’s not going to be too horrible, and then somehow you’re going to get out of those chains, and you’re going to rip her throat out. But in the meantime, focus on me.”

Derek nodded once. Stiles set his jaw, returning the nod. Committed. They both were. And then Stiles kissed him.

It was chaste at first, Stiles brushing ridiculously soft lips against his. Stiles was extraordinary, still and unsure against Derek’s mouth, his weight braced on his arms to either side of Derek’s head. Derek angled his chin up a bit and let the tip of his tongue slip out to have a taste. Stiles’ mouth fell open on a moan, and Derek lifted his head from the floor to press inside. God, the taste of Stiles. Home and freedom - and how could anyone _taste_ like freedom? Kissing Stiles was like letting Derek’s wolf instincts loose under the full moon, like running as fast as he could through the trees in the silvery light without fear. One of Stiles’ hands skimmed over Derek’s shoulder and buried itself in the hair at the base of Derek’s neck. The new position took some of the strain from Derek, supporting some of the weight of his head and allowing him to concentrate more fully on Stiles’ clever tongue as it reached tentatively for his. When Derek responded in kind, allowing the kiss to go deeper, wetter, his groan coming all the way from his toes, Stiles moaned again, and rested his forehead on Derek’s as if even this, even just a simple kiss was too intense to be borne. Above them Kate snickered but in that moment Derek didn’t give a damn. He leaned up into Stiles and took his mouth, and Stiles let him, following Derek’s lead as if he’d been born to do nothing else. By the time he pulled away, Derek was more than half hard.

Kate’s voice cut like a knife through the illusion of privacy Stiles had worked so hard to create. “I knew you were easy, babe, but I didn't realize you were _this_ easy.”

Stiles ignored her, and Derek found that he could, too. He searched Derek’s eyes, and after a second, he seemed to find what he was looking for. “It’s going to be okay,” Stiles whispered, and, Christ. Stiles was trying to comfort _him_. 

Stiles slid back down, letting his fingers glide over Derek's skin as he moved, and judging by the calculating look in his eyes the unbroken contact was fully intentional. His fingertips lingered on the inside of Derek’s thigh as he took himself in hand and stroked a time or two. 

“Do it,” Derek said, and took a steadying breath as Stiles positioned himself and pushed forward. 

It glanced off and slipped under Derek’s scrotum. Stiles blushed scarlet.

“Sorry,” he said. “Sorry, I don’t—”

“It happens,” Derek said, deliberately _not_ smiling. “Try again.”

Stiles lined his tip up against Derek’s entrance a second time, but when he moved it slipped downward. He cursed softly.

Kate snorted. “Jesus, you’re bad at this, kid. I could have fucked him by now.”

“Shut up,” Derek snarled, barely keeping the cerulean from his eyes. Stiles dropped a warm hand to Derek’s stomach; his nostrils flared as he breathed in, long and deep, filling his lungs with Stiles. It had never been so important to stay calm. 

“Hey, don’t look at me,” Kate said. “It’s not my fault your only friend is the least coordinated co-ed in Beacon Hills.”

Stiles groaned and dropped his forehead onto Derek’s knee. “Sorry,” he said into Derek’s shin. “I told you I don’t know what I’m doing.”

“Hey.” Derek waited a breath, two, until Stiles could look at him again. “It’s fine,” he said. “Get your shoulder under my knee.” Stiles blinked up at him, glanced down at Derek’s leg, and blushed a little more. Slowly, teeth sunk gently into his bottom lip, Stiles lifted Derek’s leg over his shoulder. He guided himself to Derek’s entrance again, pushed forward, and then Stiles slid inside and the lights went out everywhere else.

Music and heat and raw unadulterated power sang in Derek’s veins, flashing through him like a flood, tearing the air from his lungs. He was dizzy, reeling, suddenly drunk, his back arching hard, lifting him off the floor as every nerve in his body came afire at once. 

“Derek!”

Derek’s eyes flew open, and Stiles was right there, his own eyes impossibly wide and locking instantly with Derek’s. Something deep inside clicked into place, like completing a circuit or fitting in the last piece of a puzzle, something hot and hard anchored in the center of his chest that made his heart beat faster and his lungs drag in great gulping breaths of air. 

How had he not known? He’d never even _suspected_. His parents had said— But he’d never imagined it would be like this. Like the spin of the world had changed. Like he’d spent his whole life underwater and this, right here, was his first breath of cool, clean air. No matter what happened from here, Derek would never, ever, be the same. 

“Jesus Christ.” Kate’s voice sliced through the heat and just like that the rest of the world came crashing back. The dirt and debris beneath Derek’s back dug into his shoulder blades. His muscles burned deep after the repeated electrocution, a constant ache from being tensed to their limits for so long. His gaze locked onto the gun pointed at Stiles, forcing him to do this whether he wanted to or not. Stiles’ heart stuttered and suddenly the eyes that had been looking down on Derek with such wonder were filled with doubt. And fear. And _guilt_. 

Derek was going to fucking kill Kate. He was going to kill her and eviscerate her corpse. With his teeth.

Then Stiles reached down and laid a hand on Derek’s chest. “Just us,” he murmured under his breath, and it was a plea. Derek nodded.

“I could just shoot him,” Kate offered.

Derek ignored her. He caught Stiles’ eyes and held them. “Stiles. Do it.”

Stiles let out a nervous laugh. “Do it. Yeah. Okay.”

Mindful of the pitfalls of having to line himself up again, Stiles drew back only an inch or two and then pressed forward. The first slide was shockingly good. Easily better than anything in Derek’s previous experience, because when Stiles moved, the tight feeling in Derek’s chest moved with him. It swelled with warmth and consumed him from the inside out. Derek had never been so close to anyone, the fledgling bond drawing them together with a magnetic pull they were helpless to resist.

“ _God,_ ” Stiles whispered, his voice already wrecked. He fell forward to brace his hands on Derek’s chest, a perfect, welcome weight, and Derek wanted to reach forward with his safely human teeth, to nip and lick at those long fingers as Stiles’ hips canted. The movement sent shivers through Derek’s body, a gentle tingle that settled into that warm place in his chest.

He fought the urge. This wasn’t about what Derek wanted. It was about Stiles. Stiles, who was looking down at him, staring into his eyes like he could see through every wall Derek had ever constructed around himself, like he could see straight into Derek’s soul. Stiles moved into him again and Derek swallowed a little moan.

“Derek,” Stiles practically purred and then leaned into him, laying himself flush against Derek, miles of skin on scalding skin. Derek’s body shook from head to toe. He actually fucking trembled. He was chained to the floor, Kate was watching, Stiles was way too young, and it was still the single sweetest moment of Derek’s life. Even before Kate had ripped everything away he had never felt so utterly complete.

Derek wanted to break something. This should have been achingly beautiful, a night that Stiles, if he had chosen Derek without threats and terror and violence, would have remembered with warmth and joy for the rest of his days. Instead it was a nightmare. Derek wanted to tear Kate apart for perverting this moment, to rend her flesh and spread the pieces to the four corners of the earth, but all he could feel was the touch of his bondmate, Stiles’ fingers clutching Derek’s shoulders as he dropped his forehead onto Derek’s chest. The touch grounded Derek, gave him an anchor.

“Derek,” Stiles breathed, the words settling on Derek’s chest in puffs of moist heat as he moved. “Fuck,” Stiles whispered brokenly. “Not… God, _Derek._ ” Stiles rocked into him again, gasping.

The sudden clanking of chain broke through Derek’s haze. Stiles reared back, his fingers grasping frantically at the tightening collar around his throat. For an instant, Derek’s body flooded with panic, but before he could so much as reach for Stiles, Kate let the chain go slack again and Stiles slipped a finger under it, tugging it loose as he struggled for breath.

“Not very nice of you boys to spoil my view,” Kate scolded, spinning in little half circles in the chair.

Derek opened his mouth, but Stiles beat him to it. “Don’t,” Stiles hissed. “If this is all,” he started and then bit down on his lips, pressing them together. “She doesn’t get to have this,” he whispered. Steadying himself with a hand on Derek’s abdomen, he pressed in deeper, and Derek’s vision almost whited out with the first press against his prostate. 

“Fuck.” Derek bit down on a moan, his hands curling helplessly into fists above the iron shackles that held him. Every atom in his body screamed with need. He wanted to touch his mate, to taste, to devour. He had never been so hard in his life. He rose up into Stiles’ next thrust and groaned when Stiles pressed into him again. Stiles was so close, Derek could smell it on him. He was sixteen, and having sex for the first time. It didn’t matter that it was at gunpoint. It didn’t matter that it was with a werewolf. There was no way Stiles was going to last.

“Derek,” Stiles moaned softly, the word barely there. “Derek, Jesus. God, you… So _sorry_ , Derek, _fuck_.” His hips snapped forward in a stuttering rhythm, slamming home in a shuddering climax.

And then Kate reached for the machine.

“Kate, he’s human!” Derek shouted. “Kate, _no_!”

She laughed and moved her hand. Flinging his arms forward as far as the chains allowed, Derek managed to shove Stiles backwards a fraction of an inch before the current hit. It wasn’t enough. Electricity poured through Derek, clamping down on every muscle in his body, a fire raging in his veins. Lightning streamed through him and in every place where their bodies touched, it crashed into Stiles. Stiles’ back bowed, arcing hard as he grunted. Derek tore at his chains with more strength than he’d known he still possessed and one manacle screeched open under the pressure. Grinding his teeth together, Derek fought the relentless strain of his muscles and pushed Stiles hard. This time it was enough to separate them, propelling Stiles across the floor, away from the waves of high voltage energy carving their way through Derek’s body and eroding his sanity with cascading falls of blinding whiteness. 

Derek let go. He let the change come over him, dug the claws of his freed hand into the concrete until they snapped. Through the unending blaze and the acrid stench of charred flesh Derek felt more than heard the struggle beyond him and then the ear-splitting retort of a gunshot. He had just enough presence of mind to think _Stiles!_ before the current abruptly stopped and the world went black.


	2. Chapter 2

_Derek let go. He let the change come over him, dug the claws of his freed hand into the concrete until they snapped. Through the unending blaze and the acrid stench of charred flesh Derek felt more than heard the struggle beyond him and then the ear-splitting retort of a gunshot. He had just enough presence of mind to think_ Stiles! _before the current abruptly stopped and the world went black._

***

Waking up was like raking his body over a bed of hot coals. Rigor still gripped his muscles, pressing against his lungs like a pile of boulders on his chest, unyielding against his effort as he strained to drag in a shallow breath. The air, dank and thick, made his head spin and his stomach turn. He couldn’t think. His mind was murky, too heavy and far away to reach, and his stomach felt split open and weighted down, like someone had torn out his intestines and replaced them with a host of writhing iron serpents. A voice above him was murmuring, “Please, _please_ , Derek,” but he couldn’t force his eyes to open. Kate had virtually fried his insides, and Derek could barely move. He wanted to reach out for Stiles, to say something to banish the desperation from his voice, but Derek’s healing had a long way to go. Almost immediately, the darkness took him back.

When he woke again, he could breathe. His lungs ached, and when he tried to take a deep breath his muscles protested insistently, but he could move, which was a definite improvement. He opened his eyes to see Stiles kneeling beside him. Apparently while he was out Stiles had crawled back into his jeans, though his boxers were dangling haphazardly from the pocket.

“Oh, thank god,” Stiles said, his relief palpable.

Derek tried to lift his head but the world immediately tilted on its axis. He rested it back on the ground, took a painfully deep breath. “How long was I out?”

“Almost an hour,” Stiles said, reaching out for him, but then he froze. Awkwardly he brought his hand back to his side. “I didn’t know what to do,” he said quietly.

“It’s fine.” Derek shifted his own arm and held back a groan by the barest of margins when it sent a jolt of pain spasming through his chest. “What about Kate?”

Stiles swallowed once, nervous, and scooted out of his line of sight.

As soon as Derek saw the body he could smell the blood. Jesus, he was out of it. That stench should have been overpowering.

She was dead. After so many years, at long last, the blood of his family was avenged. Kate Argent was dead and Derek felt…

Nothing. 

He felt nothing. Just weary down to his bones. All this time and he'd thought her death would, not make it right, but that it would change things somehow. Change him. His eyes fell on Stiles and he almost smiled. He was changed. Just not the way he had expected.

“We have to go,” Derek said, sitting up slowly. His clothes and what must have been the rest of Stiles’ sat in a small pile beside him. “She was bringing another guy down to interrogate me. I have no idea when he was supposed to come back.” He ignored the stricken look on Stiles’ face and shoved Stiles’ T-shirt in his direction. “Move, Stiles. Now.”

He supposed he should be grateful that Stiles took his shirt and turned a polite back to allow Derek to get into his jeans, as useless as the gesture was after everything they had just done. Derek wasn’t exactly worried for his modesty at this point. The second he got his weight under him, his vision blurred and his head spun wildly; Derek grabbed one of the bars to steady himself and watched Stiles flinch with the aborted desire to turn and offer help. Thankfully the dizziness passed quickly, and once he had evened out, Derek finished dressing without comment.

“Where’s the gun?” Derek asked, and Stiles turned, looking a little green himself.

“It’s there,” Stiles said, pointing to where it lay on the floor, abandoned, about a foot from Kate’s cooling body.

Derek’s first instinct was to walk over there and scoop it up, but that wasn’t the best idea when he could barely stand without falling. “Bring it to me.” 

Stiles nodded, but made no move to get closer to the body. His heartbeat stuttered.

Derek frowned. “Stiles?” 

“The keys were,” Stiles stopped, swallowed. “The keys were in her pocket.”

The keys. The keys Stiles had used to unlock Derek from the other manacle had been in the pocket of the _dead body_ of the woman Stiles had _shot_ to save him. Jesus. No wonder he looked so freaked. He was a killer at sixteen. “I’ll get it,” Derek said. He stepped toward the body but his knee buckled. Stiles was across the room with a shoulder under his arm before he could even blink.

“Whoa, there, chief. I think your adventuring days are over for a little while. In case you missed it, you totally just took an arrow to the knee.”

Derek didn’t have the faintest clue what Stiles was talking about, but the sentiment was clear enough. Gently, Stiles guided him back to the bars and, taking a labored breath, Derek grabbed hold of them.

“Stay here,” Stiles said, glancing grimly at the corpse on the floor. “I’ll get it.” He moved quickly, giving the body a wide berth as he darted to the other side of the room and back. Stiles handled the gun as if it were a live scorpion, touching it as little as possible and pressing the cool metal into Derek’s palm as soon as he could.

Leaning against the bars for support, Derek wiped down the surface of the weapon with his shirt. Nothing could come back to connect this with Stiles. Then he took a deep breath, gripped a bar, and pushed off. He teetered for a second; Stiles reached out, but Derek waved his hand away. He managed to walk over to Kate’s body unaided, steering clear of the blood pooling on the floor at the back of her neck. The shot had gone through her throat into the base of her skull. It was an ugly way to die. When the gun went off it must have scared the shit out of Stiles, but he’d made himself face the results head on to get Derek free. Stiles had returned to the body of the woman he had killed. He’d rifled through her pockets to find the key and with Derek uselessly unconscious on the floor, Stiles had gone through the whole ordeal alone.

Using the bottom of his shirt to hold the pistol, Derek slowly crouched down and wrapped Kate’s stiffening fingers around the grip. It probably wouldn’t put the cops off for long, but judging by the exit wound at least the angle wasn’t impossible. If they were lucky there might even be powder on her hands. Stiles watched him silently, his eyes skittering away from the corpse but being drawn back every few seconds. 

“We need to get out of here,” Derek said softly. “Did you touch anything else?”

Stiles looked around, considering, and nodded. “The whatever that is,” he said, pointing to the contraption on the desk. “I had to shut it off.” 

Nodding in return, Derek used the desk for leverage to push himself to his feet, ignoring the wave of dizziness that swept over him, and wiped down the dials on the power supply and the set of keys lying next to it. “Out,” he said when he’d finished, motioning toward the door. Stiles obligingly went to the heavy steel and heaved it open, but he hesitated.

“Derek?”

“I’m fine. Go on,” he said, but Stiles waited for him anyway.

Derek made his way across the room with slow steps. He staggered, but he didn’t fall, so he counted that as a victory. When he reached the door, Stiles slipped under his shoulder and maneuvered a hand around Derek’s middle. Warmth fluttered in his chest at having so much of the wiry kid - his _bondmate_ , he swallowed down forcibly - pressed against him.

“You need to go,” Derek said, carefully resting his weight on one side. “You’ve been out all night.”

Stiles shook his head, taking a step and shuffling them along. “Dad’s working a double. He won’t even know I wasn’t home unless Mrs. Gorsha got up for a midnight cup of chamomile and noticed the Jeep wasn’t there. And if she tells him, I’ll just say I was at Scott’s.”

Jesus, Scott. Derek had thrown himself at Kate’s guns to give him and the Whittemore kid time to get the hell out of there, but he didn’t actually know whether or not they’d gotten out unscathed. “Scott?” 

“Yeah. He was shot, but he’s fine, by the way.” Derek grunted his approval. “Nice move, taking his phone. When Kate carjacked me, she took me on a joy ride all over the preserve - like I wouldn’t realize where she was headed - and I had to pretend I wasn’t already on my way here.”

So Stiles had figured it out. He’d been coming for Derek after all. “Alone?”

“Well, yeah.” Stiles shrugged the shoulder not supporting Derek’s weight. “I didn’t think Allison was in on it, but I wasn’t completely sure, and in case you haven’t noticed, Scott’s judgement isn’t exactly crystal where Allison is involved. I had to get rid of him first, which was kind of hard considering he was freaking out trying to find his phone so that he could find you to help him protect his girlfriend from your crazy uncle.”

“Jesus.”

“Yeah,” Stiles agreed, and they lapsed into silence. They were moving at a snail’s pace; Derek was too weak to move with any kind of speed and Stiles wasn’t strong enough to do much more than hold him up while he tried to drag himself forward against the dirt-covered wall. At least they could see the end of the tunnel now, early dawn painting the leaves on the ground outside in a pale grey.

“You’re not healing,” Stiles observed quietly after a moment, his arm tightening a little around Derek’s waist.

“Too much damage, too fast,” Derek answered. “It’ll take time. A few hours at least.” And rest, in a safe place where his hypervigilant wolf instincts could rest, too.

“Well, that’s crap.” The little tug on the bond drawing him closer to Stiles might have been Derek’s imagination, but then again, it might not have been. “Now that they’ve defiled your house,” Stiles continued, “do you have a place to crash until you get your strength back?”

He’d find something. But something safe, without a pack to watch his back? With the Argents still out there? With Peter around but slightly _off_ , acting nothing like the uncle Derek had known? Not likely. “Yeah,” he lied. 

Stiles rolled his eyes. “You know, for a guy who grew up with a house full of living lie detectors you sure try it a lot. Hey, maybe that’s why you suck so badly at it?”

“Stiles, shut up.”

Stiles tried for a grin, but it was strained. “There’s my sourwolf.”

Derek grumbled as they reached the opening of the tunnel, but he couldn’t deny the tiny burst of warmth in his chest when Stiles unknowingly acknowledged their bond. This was bad. This was dangerous. Derek had enemies, and allies who were unreliable at best, and Stiles was _sixteen_. If the bond solidified it would be unbreakable, and Stiles didn’t have the slightest clue what was going on.

Once they cleared the tunnel entrance, Stiles pushing open the barred gate and climbing out before taking Derek’s hand and pulling him through, the air was cleaner. Not so damp. Just the fresh crispness of sunrise. Derek breathed in deep and then winced when the stretch of his lungs was too much for his chest.

“There you go,” Stiles said, helping shift Derek’s weight until he was leaning heavily on a tree trunk. “The jeep is that way.”

Derek nodded. He kept his eyes down, not wanting to watch Stiles walk off into the trees. Getting away from Derek was the right move for Stiles, no matter how much the little place in Derek’s chest ached at the thought, but Derek knew himself and his limitations. He couldn’t watch Stiles walk away. Stiles would be safer away from him. That was all that mattered. 

As for Derek, he needed to put some distance between himself and the house before Kate’s enforcer decided to pay another visit. He didn’t know where he was headed yet, but any place had to be better than here. With effort, he shoved himself away from the tree and stumbled toward the next trunk, letting his hand catch most of his weight to steady him. He pushed through the soreness in his muscles and staggered forward, reaching for the next tree. It was a constant struggle to stay upright now that Stiles was gone, but he focused every drop of energy he had left into keeping himself on his feet. He had to get somewhere where he could heal.

He was so focused on his task that he didn’t even hear the engine until the Jeep pulled up beside him, the window rolled down. “Get in.”

Derek stared. “Are you crazy?”

“Crazy is wanting to stay here with a dead body you’re not strong enough to move yet and Batshit Crazypants’ BFF showing up any minute to _torture_ you some more.”

Derek shook his head. “You go. I’ll find my own way.”

“It is categorically ridiculous for you to argue this with me, do you know that?”

“Stiles, I was desperate and careless before and look what happened. We can’t be seen together. It’s dangerous for you.”

“I’m not leaving you alone,” Stiles exclaimed, banging his fist on the steering wheel with a strength that seemed to startle him. He took a deep breath and turned to Derek, pinning him in place with nothing more than the force of his glare. “I am not leaving you here on your own and that is final. Now get in the car!”

With a groan he refused to voice, Derek realized he’d showed up at the house with Jackson, in Jackson’s Porsche. The Camaro was still at the school, and Derek was too fucking exhausted to make it anywhere on foot. As ill advised as it might have been, Derek got into the car.

***

Stiles was nearly silent in the Jeep, his hands in a white-knuckled grip on the steering wheel that Derek was careful not to point out. He stared straight ahead, sneaking furtive looks at Derek every four or five seconds, until Derek gave up watching and turned to his window instead.

The forest raced by. Then the town. Stiles was going to get pulled over if he wasn’t careful, but he was obviously in a rush to be home, to be somewhere he felt safe, and Derek wouldn’t begrudge him that for all the world. Derek had almost forgotten what it was like to have a place like that. He watched the mirror for any signs of Kate’s enforcer or a cop following behind them and tried to ignore the way Stiles’ scent was filling up the small space and rolling over him, making him want something he should never have had in the first place. He rolled his window down halfway.

When they arrived at the Stilinski house, Stiles took a weird little breath before turning to Derek. “Take the upstairs shower. I’ll find you something to wear.”

The front door wasn’t locked, but once they were inside, Stiles turned the toggle in the doorknob and then the deadbolt. His fingers lingered on the metal plate for just a second too long, and then he turned to Derek with forced cheerfulness. “Up the stairs. It’s the second door on the right. I’m sure you want to wash all the crazy off.”

Derek hesitated. Stiles looked more or less okay, but something wasn’t exactly right. Derek could feel it in that new, tight place in his chest. Stiles ought to be exhausted and relieved, but he wasn’t. It bothered Derek as he climbed the stairs and tossed his clothes into the corner of the bathroom, stuck in his mind like an itch he couldn’t scratch right up until the moment that he stepped into the shower. Then for a few minutes his mind went blissfully blank. His old house was out of the way. He’d jury rigged the power well enough, and it was livable. Hot water, however, was a commodity he just hadn’t been able to finagle. Long after the sweat and dirt had rinsed down the drain, Derek stood under the spray, letting the heat bleed into muscles taut with agony and regret. 

When the water began to run cool he pulled the towel off the rack, wrapped it around his waist, and took a good, long look at himself in the mirror. He looked so normal. Nothing about his reflection would indicate that he’d been tortured for more than a day. There was no evidence of the metaphysical bond that was supposed to change his life. Just the same old Derek Hale looking back at him. Weak minded moron who’d gotten his family killed. What the hell was he thinking even considering letting this thing with Stiles develop into anything real? Kate might have been a murdering bitch, but she was right. Stiles didn’t need more complications in his life.

As if the thought of Stiles’ name had conjured his presence, there was a knock at the door. “Derek? Are you decent?” 

Sighing, Derek opened the door and breathed in a lungful of _Stiles_. Freshly showered, the smell of him was even more powerful. 

“They’re my dad’s,” Stiles said, handing over a neatly folded pair of jeans and faded T-shirt. “I’d have brought you some of mine, but,” he shrugged, giving a quick, sheepish smile, “’No fit.’”

Derek wanted to roll his eyes. He really did. Instead, he found himself taking the pile of clothes, saying, “Thanks,” in a soft voice, and waiting for Stiles to leave the bathroom so that he could change.

Except that didn’t actually happen. Stiles stood staring, his eyes moving downward slowly. With a rush of warmth, Derek realized Stiles was tracking water droplets as they slid down his chest toward the towel at his waist. 

When Stiles realized what he’d been doing his eyes went comically wide. “Sorry,” he stammered and backed out of the bathroom so fast that he tripped over his own feet and banged his arm on the door jamb. Derek reached out to steady him, but he slipped away and closed - slammed - the door behind him. Again, a feeling of unease grew in that place where Derek felt the tenuous beginnings of their bond. Derek threw on the worn jeans and shirt Stiles had brought him and headed down to the kitchen.

Stiles was waiting for him at the table, but was on his feet as soon as Derek walked into the room. “Coffee?” he offered.

Coffee sounded like heaven, but Derek was off caffeine until the healing process was over. “Decaf?”

Stiles’ face scrunched into a disgusted moue. “Ugh! Why would you do that to yourself? Tea?” he suggested instead, pulling out a box of herbal.

“Sure.” He expected Stiles to throw a mug of water in the microwave, but Stiles pulled a tea kettle out of one of the cabinets and walked it to the sink. 

“So,” Stiles said while he held the kettle under the water, “what was that place?”

They were jumping right in, then. Okay. At least this was an easy one. “It’s where my family used to go. It’s where we locked ourselves up during the full moon until we learned to control the shift.”

“So you spent time down there as a kid? Seems a little—” his voice trailed off.

“Spartan?” Derek supplied.

Stiles turned the burner on and put the kettle down. “I was going to say cold and unwelcoming.” He smiled, but it vanished as quickly as it appeared. “But Spartan works.”

“It wasn’t like that when we were kids,” Derek explained while Stiles scooped the coffee grinds into a filter. “My dad used to read to us. Laura hated it because he’d always read—” Derek froze, snapped his mouth shut. What the hell had possessed him? He didn’t talk about his family. Ever. Especially not Laura. If he started, he didn’t know if he would ever be able to stop, and the grief would swallow him whole.

What kind of a mess was his life when talking about underage sex at gunpoint was the _easier_ of two conversations he could be having? Beyond that, though, he knew that the very least of everything he owed Stiles was an explanation. 

Stiles put the coffee pot in the sink and turned on the water. Derek took a deep breath. “About what we did tonight, Stiles—”

“Don’t.” Stiles whispered without turning, his fingers curling over the side of the sink. “Don’t say it didn’t mean anything. Lie if you have to.”

Jesus Christ. Derek’s heart constricted painfully, the bond twisting in his chest. Stiles was putting on a brave face, but his anxiety, his _sorrow_ radiated through their budding connection and stole all the air from Derek’s lungs. Lie if you have to. Like being with Stiles hadn’t been the single most meaningful thing Derek had ever experienced. 

“It wouldn’t be a lie,” Derek said softly. “And I wouldn’t. Not about something like this.” Stiles nodded, poured the water into the coffee maker, and sat down. “You didn’t tell her about Peter,” Derek said.

“Of course I didn’t. Do I look stupid to you? Don’t answer that,” he finished quickly, scrubbing his face with one hand. “Look, it was obvious that you weren’t giving Peter up, despite him being a scary freak who tried to kill me, so I knew something must have changed between you two that I didn’t know about. You must have had a reason for keeping your mouth shut.”

A reason? Because Peter was the only family Derek had left. Because Peter had lost Laura too, and he would have to live with the guilt of what he’d done for the rest of his life. Because enough Hale blood had been spilled at the hands of Kate Argent. But none of that was Stiles’ problem.

“You’re not used to having a team, are you?”

Derek scowled. “I don’t see how that—”

“I backed your play,” Stiles interrupted. “If you haven’t noticed, despite the occasional bitching and moaning about it, I always back your play.”

Derek blinked, momentarily stymied. The kicker was, Stiles was right. He hadn’t sold Derek out to his father when Derek was a wanted fugitive hiding in the sheriff’s own house. He had been ready to amputate Derek’s arm when Derek had told him it was necessary. When Derek needed him, Stiles had been there every single time. Derek could count on Stiles. It was loyalty Derek hadn't earned.

Looking more exhausted than Derek had ever seen him, Stiles stood and retrieved the kettle from the stove just as it was starting to whistle. “Do you take anything in your tea?” he asked.

Derek shook his head. Stiles poured the water and set the mug on the table in front of Derek; he wrapped both hands around it for something to do. It was warm in his hands, comforting somehow, in the way a half-remembered dream can be, or a pleasant memory he couldn’t quite place. God, he was tired.

“So what gives?” Stiles asked when he sat back down. 

“About?”

“About Peter, the former psychopath you seem to be playing nice with all of a sudden?”

“He’s not,” Derek searched for the word, “himself right now. Laura was an accident. He didn’t know what he was doing, but becoming the alpha healed him the rest of the way.” 

Stiles nodded. “Okay. And Scott?”

“Scott was a bad call.”

“A bad _call_?” Stiles sputtered.

“Peter had been in a coma for six years,” Derek tried to explain. “For him, the fire had just happened, and he was all alone, and still weak, and the Argents were back in town and he was afraid.” Even as he was saying it he knew it didn’t excuse what Peter had done to Scott, or the conniving way he was handling trying to bring Scott into the pack. 

Stiles was quiet for a long time. He got up, filled his coffee, added milk from the fridge and sat back down at the table without saying a word. Then he looked up, and Derek forced himself to breathe. Stiles had given up everything to protect Peter for Derek’s sake. He hoped to god Stiles would think it had been worth it.

“It doesn’t make it okay,” Stiles said, “what he did to Scott.” Derek opened his mouth to agree, but Stiles stopped him, the steel in his eyes belying the deliberate calm in his voice. “It’s fucked up, and it can’t ever be fixed. But I understand being afraid of Kate Argent. There was something wrong with her, Derek. I could see it in her eyes when she flipped the switch. She wasn’t trying to get you to talk, she was just enjoying it.” For a moment, Stiles’ eyes went distant, as if he were trapped back there, watching Kate’s madness all over again. After a second he let his hand fall to the table, his eyes following the motion, and shook his head with a sigh. “And then I hurt you worse than she did.”

Derek’s breath caught, the air turning thick in his lungs. It twisted down his throat and choked him with something that tasted like despair. Suddenly he was drowning, suffocating in misery, but it wasn't his own. _Stiles._ Stiles was in anguish and the strength of his guilt bore down on Derek like an avalanche. 

“Don’t you get it?” Derek leaned forward, needing to be closer, needing to see it in Stiles’ eyes when he finally understood. “I was _glad_. I was glad it was you instead of her.”

Stiles clutched at his chest. “Oh, the shock,” he scoffed. “Instead of being raped by the person who slaughtered everyone you ever loved you could be raped by someone you more or less trust, and you were relieved. Really. I can’t imagine why.”

How could Stiles not understand this? “You didn’t rape me,” Derek said, his voice low but insistent.

“Yeah? You were chained to the floor, Derek. The only one with a choice was _me_ , and I—” Stiles stopped abruptly, pressed his lips together.

Derek’s brows drew into a furrow. “And you what, Stiles?”

Shaking his head, Stiles dropped his gaze back to the table and for a few long seconds, he was completely still. Enough time passed that Derek assumed Stiles wasn’t going to say anything after all, but when Stiles finally raised his eyes, the agony on his face struck Derek like a set of claws to the gut. 

“I chose to do that to you,” Stiles said.

Derek let out a breath he hadn’t known he was holding. Finally, he understood. Stiles blamed himself for all of it, for everything that had happened in that godforsaken basement, which in hindsight was extremely _Stiles_ and Derek really should have known. He reached for Stiles’ hand slowly, not at all sure his touch would be welcome, but Stiles let Derek lay his palm over Stiles’ cool fingers and squeeze lightly. The bond hummed in Derek’s chest and he relaxed minutely, watching Stiles’ hunched look ease a little in response. “You did make a choice,” Derek agreed, his voice careful. “You chose to save me.”

Stiles stared at where their hands lay joined on the table, but Derek could see he wasn’t focusing on anything except what was playing out inside his head. “She was going to kill me, you know,” Derek said quietly. Stiles’ head snapped up. “When she realized she wouldn’t get Peter’s identity from me, or whenever she got sick of torturing me, she was going to kill me. You stopped her.”

Stiles chuckled darkly. “If that was a rescue, it was the worst one in the history of ever.” Derek opened his mouth to disagree, but Stiles barreled on as if now that he’d started, he was incapable of stopping. “No, really. Let’s review,” he said. “I got myself caught by a woman who is easily the craziest person I have ever encountered, did nothing to stop it while she tortured you in front of me, and then I forced you to have sex with me while she watched. Brilliant. That’s the stuff of legends, right there. I’ll have my own comic book in no time.”

"She had a gun to your head. She forced your hand.” Stiles shook his head but Derek plowed on. “Stiles, this was not your fault."

“Of course it was! My hands. My,” his free hand flailed, “other parts! I—”

“Did what you had to,” Derek broke in. “You protected your father. You protected me. And you protected yourself, which is the most important part," he added under his breath. He rubbed his thumb over the back of Stiles' hand. The skin was soft and thin. Fragile in a way this boy was proving himself not to be in the slightest.

“Really? Because I was there, Derek. That’s not how it looked to me.”

“Well, you know how it looked to me? Like a sixteen-year-old kid went up against a psychopath with lethal combat skills and won.”

“Kid,” Stiles huffed through his nose self-deprecatingly and looked away. “Yeah, guess that’s all I am really. A stupid kid.”

Derek knew he was making a complete ass of himself, but he couldn’t stop now. Not while guilt still thrummed through their bond so strongly it made Derek ache inside. “She took something precious from you, too, Stiles. She made me a party to that. And you let her, because it would save me. No one’s ever—” 

He stopped, the words caught in his throat. 

Little wonder; Derek probably hadn’t said so much at once in ten years. Not since Kate had torn his very being apart, and now Stiles, this ridiculous, unassuming man-child, had somehow managed to put him back together again. Even these new, nebulous tendrils of the bond they shared made Derek feel stronger, more in control, more _whole_ than he could remember ever having been before. He took a deep breath. “No one has ever been willing to sacrifice so much just for me. It means something to me. It always will.”

Stiles exhaled shakily.

"This wasn’t your fault," Derek repeated softly, squeezing the fingers in his. He wanted to find that place inside of him, the thread that bound them together, and just _tug_ until they were joined so completely that Stiles could feel everything that Derek felt, until he wouldn’t know where Derek ended and he began, but Derek buried the impulse deep. He didn’t have the right to strengthen their bond, not without Stiles’ consent, but he had to do something. He had to get this through Stiles’ stubborn head before the guilt eating at Stiles reached out and destroyed them both. "This is on Kate,” Derek pronounced slowly, his eyes never leaving his mate’s, “not you. She wanted me to hurt you. She wanted to hurt both of us. Don’t let her. "

Sensing Stiles' hesitation, Derek seized the opportunity to hammer the point home. He lifted Stiles’ hand from the table and pressed it over his own heart, obstinately ignoring the flash of heat that seared through his chest at the touch and the way Stiles’ pulse began to race. 

“Feel _this_ ,” Derek insisted. “ _This_ is what you did.” He knew he sucked at talking, and badly, but he could feel Stiles’ resolve wavering even though Derek sounded like an idiot. Stiles deserved someone who knew how to talk to other human beings, but Derek was what Stiles had right now and he couldn’t screw this up. “ _This_ is the choice you made,” he said, holding Stiles’ hand over his heart. “This is still beating because of you. Please,” he asked and then softened his voice, “ _please_ , Stiles. Don’t hate yourself for saving me.”

Derek felt something crack inside him, inside Stiles. Something deep and heavy broke open and relief washed over them both, tears filling Stiles’ eyes. The bond warmed, soothing, in Derek’s chest and Stiles’, the tension in Stiles’ shoulders dissipating a little. Derek took a cleansing breath and Stiles’ full lips quirked up into the semblance of a smile.

“Saving you isn’t something I could ever regret.” He looked into Derek’s eyes and Derek felt the pull of their bond down to his core.

Already the link between them was beginning to grow stronger, fortifying with even the simplest of touches, making Derek crave Stiles’ skin against his own. It was dangerous, wanting so much when the future of their bond was so tenuous, when Stiles might not want - when he shouldn’t want - to let it become something permanent. Reluctantly, Derek took his hand from Stiles’, letting Stiles’ fingers fall from his chest, and wrapped his hand around his mug of tea to keep himself from reaching forward again.

Stiles shadowed Derek’s movement and then brought his coffee to his lips, blowing lightly to cool it before taking a sip and wincing as it went down. It wasn’t the heat that hurt, Derek knew; it was the beating his esophagus had taken as he struggled against the collar Kate had had around his neck, the bruising that was just beginning to show on Stiles’ throat. Derek’s fingers itched with the desire to raise his hands to the purpling places where links of chain had caught and rent tender flesh, leaving blood in their wake. He wanted to lay his fingers on those marks and drain the hurt away until there was nothing left. He gripped his mug harder.

“We should talk about what else happened tonight,” he said quietly instead. The last thing he wanted to do was to sit around discussing their feelings more than they already had - Derek had exhausted his sharing-is-caring quota somewhere around the time they’d walked through Stiles’ front door - but this had gone far enough without Stiles’ consent. He had already taken enough from Stiles without asking. He wouldn’t allow their connection to deepen without Stiles’ express approval, and Derek refused to force Stiles to gather up the courage to mention it first.

He breathed in deep, allowing himself one quiet moment to memorize this feeling, the way his head was clearer, the comfortable warmth that had settled in his chest at just the proximity of his mate. Even with the soul-destroying prospect of Stiles not wanting to accept him or the bond, he still felt stronger and more in control that he had for – well, for years. It filled a hole inside him that had been empty for a long time, a Laura-and-family shaped hole that, somehow, Stiles’ presence made softer around the edges. In a moment, all this could be gone. It should be, he reminded himself ruthlessly, but he could admit to himself down deep where no one else would ever know that he wasn’t strong enough to give it up on his own.

Stiles watched him, not prodding, not pushing, letting Derek come to him in his own time with more patience than Derek would have credited him. “So,” Derek mumbled, “tonight.”

Carefully, methodically, Stiles placed his mug onto the table, folded his hands in his lap, and raised his eyes to Derek’s. “I take it sex with werewolves doesn’t always feel like the birth of a star?” 

Taking a sip of his tea to buy a few more seconds, Derek raised a single brow. Stiles seemed unimpressed. 

“Look, are you going to tell me what happened in there? Or do I have to go start Googling?”

Derek cleared his throat. “Sometimes, and it’s not that common, when a werewolf finds someone particularly compatible—”

Stiles snickered. “Are you seriously going to give me the ‘wolves and the bees’ talk? Because I’m pretty sure I just learned all that in the field.”

“It’s not that simple.” Derek frowned. This was not going at all the way he’d planned, but it was Stiles. Nothing ever went as planned when he was involved. “Look, you didn’t ask for this, and I know that, but when a wolf joins with a potential mate sometimes there’s a,” he reached for an appropriate word, but he was having a bonding conversation with a sixteen-year-old – with _Stiles_ – and ‘appropriate’ wasn’t even on the same planet. He finally settled on, “A connection. That connection can grow to be very strong, or it can fade away to nothing, and what happens next has to be your decision.”

“My decision? Why not our decision? What do you want?”

What Derek wanted was to take his bondmate into his arms and bury his face in Stiles’ neck, to have the right to stand between Stiles and danger, to lay his claim so deeply that other wolves would be able to smell it from half a mile off. “What I want doesn’t matter. This was forced on you.”

“It was forced on you, too. And now you have some weird mystical connection to a hyperactive sixteen-year-old with a penchant for bad luck, who spends half the day tripping over his own feet.” Stiles smiled, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “And I have a connection to a superhot guy who, granted, gets furry and might try to kill me once a month.”

“Look, this wasn’t exactly how I wanted to end up bonded to someone either.”

Stiles pressed his lips together and nodded, as if this was what he’d expected to hear. “So you didn’t want it, then. The bond.”

“That’s not what I said.” Derek sighed. “You’re so young, Stiles. You have your whole life ahead of you. Life with me is bound to be,” he breathed in deeply, “complicated.”

“You mean I could get drawn into the world of the supernatural? Have to lie to my dad every day? Get kidnapped by psychos? I’m pretty much there already, Derek.”

He wanted to agree with such an easy acceptance of the risk but Stiles wasn’t thinking this through, and before he could decide he had to understand. “I mean you could become a target,” Derek said, “and not just from my enemies, which is a very real danger.” Stiles’ brows drew together and he opened his mouth to speak, but Derek held out his hand to ask for a minute to finish. “If there is an ‘us’ and anyone found out about it,” Derek continued and then sighed again. “I’m older than you, by a lot. I’m a person of interest in my sister’s murder. Not exactly every parent’s dream for their teenaged son. Not to mention, have you ever expressed interest in a guy before? What would your friends say if they found out? What would Scott say?”

“You’re making this all sound really complicated, and it’s not. There’s only one question that matters.” Stiles caught his gaze, holding it steadily. “Wolfy magic thingies aside, did you want me before the bond?”

The right thing to do would be to tell Stiles no, to tell him that everything Derek felt was a result of the preternatural connection they had forged in a moment of extreme duress, but Stiles looked so resigned, so sure he was about to be rejected, and Derek found that he couldn’t give voice to so profound an untruth. “Yes,” he admitted. “Yes, I did.”

“Yes,” Stiles repeated, nodding to himself. “All right. Okay, so I’m going to kiss you now.” He laid his hand on Derek’s knee, carefully, as if he was afraid Derek was a spooked animal and any contact might send him skittering away. Derek stared at it pointedly and raised an eyebrow, but Stiles didn’t move. He was always so goddamned brave, always so all-or-nothing and never-back-down and fuck. Derek couldn’t help it. After everything they had been through, everything they had endured since the second they met, it was this moment, right here in the middle of the Stilinski family kitchen, that - bonded or not - Derek Hale fell head over heels. Jesus, that sounded sappy, even in his own mind. The muscles in his face twitched in an unfamiliar configuration, and it wasn’t for a few seconds that Derek realized he was grinning. 

Stiles’ eyes positively lit up when Derek smiled and it was that right there, that passion, that complete inability to hold any part of himself back from anything, that had drawn Derek to him in the first place. Stiles curled a hand behind Derek’s neck and Derek leaned in to close the last few inches himself.

When their lips met Stiles opened to him almost immediately, offering himself up wholly. He tasted of coffee with too much cream and again, that faint hint of star anise and clove. The bond flared in Derek’s chest and from the way Stiles gasped into his mouth, he knew Stiles felt it, too. Derek could hardly believe it. His bond. His _mate_. Even with all the risks involved, Stiles wanted this. They both did. They’d have to go slow - Derek wouldn’t make it permanent until Stiles was old enough to choose that kind of commitment for himself - but Stiles wanted to try. It was almost inconceivable to think that after all the crap Derek had gone through in his life, something as rare and beautiful as a matebond, a miracle for which he hadn’t even dared to hope since a naive sixteen-year-old had let a demon woman tear his life apart, was something that, maybe, just maybe, Derek might be allowed to have. Derek slid his hand under Stiles’ on his knee and turned it. He laced their fingers together, touching palm to palm, and felt the bond ripple with pleasure. 

“Stiles, I don’t,” he grimaced, and squeezed Stiles’ hand a little. “I don’t actually know how to do this. My longest relationship was with a deranged bitch who murdered my entire family.”

“And my longest relationship was never.” Stiles shrugged, but he squeezed Derek’s hand in return. “But I’ve wanted this almost as long as I’ve known you, and clearly the universe thinks we’re meant for each other, and I am not going to let what that bitch did take it away from us. Now,” he grinned a little, “are you done making excuses? Because these lips aren’t going to kiss themselves.”

Jesus. Derek was well and truly lost. He leaned in again, sweeping his lips across his mate’s, and then smiled against Stiles’ mouth. “How long until your dad gets back?”

“I don’t know. Let me find out.” He pulled his phone from his pocket and scowled at it. “Battery’s dead. Pass me the house phone?” 

There was a wireless handset on the counter next to Derek and he handed it over, watching as Stiles dialed a number by heart and waited for someone to pick up. “Hi, Carla,” he said when the ringing stopped, “can I talk to my dad?”

_“Sure, honey.”_

It took a second before the sheriff’s voice came over the line, sounding exhausted. _“Hey, son, what’s up?”_

“I’m running a fever,” Stiles lied. Derek raised an eyebrow and Stiles shrugged, the corner of his mouth turning up mischieviously. “And I’m a little nauseous. Is it all right if I stay home from school today and rest?”

The sheriff sighed. _“Yeah, it’s all right, but Stiles, I’m buried up to my eyeballs here today. I don’t think I’ll make it home before dinner.”_

“It’s fine, Dad. I’ll just sleep most of the day anyway. I can microwave some soup if I get hungry.”

_“Sorry, son. I’d be there if I could. If this wasn’t important...”_

“I know, Dad. Make sure you eat. And something with leafy greens. Carla will tell me if you snag a burger somewhere.”

_“It’s a conspiracy,”_ the sheriff huffed, but Derek would have to be deaf not to hear the fondness in his voice.

“You know it. Bye, Dad. I love you.”

_“I love you, too, Stiles.”_

Stiles clicked off the phone and laid it on the table. “I assume you heard that?” Derek nodded. “So,” Stiles asked hesitatingly, “do you want to stay?”

Yes. God, yes, he wanted to stay. “I don’t think that’s such a good idea.”

Stiles nodded as if he understood, but then shook his head. “No. Want to know what I think? I think the chances are better than average that watching you be electrocuted, watching you screaming in pain, is going to figure pretty heavily into my nightmares for the next millenium, but probably especially in the dreams I’m likely to have right now. I think when I wake up with my heart racing and I’m halfway to hyperventilating, it would be nice to be able to see that you’re okay. I think you should stay.” He paused, and let out some of the nervous breath he’d been holding. “I think I’d feel safer if you stayed.”

It had been a long time since Derek’s pain was the stuff of someone else’s nightmares, but Stiles’ heart was steady as a metronome. He wasn’t exaggerating. He really believed that knowing Derek was safe would make him feel more secure. Derek swallowed down the tightness in his chest and pushed himself up from the table. He offered his hand to Stiles and smiled inwardly when Stiles took it. “I’ll stay,” he promised. 

Stiles led him into the living room and was pulling him towards the stairs when Derek stopped him. “Down here,” he said firmly.

“Here?” Stiles asked, confused.

“We need to take things slowly. If we go up to your bedroom, if we crawl into your bed, after the day we’ve had...” he struggled to explain.

“Things aren’t going to go slow,” Stiles finished for him. “So we stay down here for now.”

Derek nodded, relieved that Stiles wasn’t going to push the issue. There was nothing, absolutely nothing, that Derek wanted to do more than take Stiles to bed, to rub his scent all over him, to touch him in all the ways Kate’s shackles had denied them, to claim him and complete their bond, and that was exactly why they needed to stick to the couch. He moved to the pale grey sofa and sat down, patting the seat next to him. “Come here,” he offered.

Stiles eyed him warily. “The couch is a little small.”

“You’ll feel better if we’re touching. And it’ll feed the bond; you’ll heal faster.” Stiles hesitated, giving a last look up towards his bedroom, and then sat gingerly beside Derek on the sofa, as if he didn’t quite know how close he was allowed to be now that the nature of their relationship had changed. Reaching forward, Derek brushed his fingers over the bruise on Stiles’ cheek, the bond purring contentedly when Stiles leaned into his touch. The movement drew Derek’s eyes down to his mate’s long neck: pale, perfect flesh desecrated by the lacerations Kate’s cruel chain had wrought. “How bad is it?”

Stiles smiled softly. “Not bad.” He was lying, but Derek knew he’d never admit it.

“Can I?”

“Whatever you want,” Stiles said, and oh, but that kind of faith was a heady thing. 

Derek pressed lightly into the bruising around Stiles’ throat and sort of _tugged_ from somewhere deep inside. Pain seeped from his mate into him, staining his veins an inky black as it traveled up his wrist and over the crook of his elbow to disappear under the sleeve of his shirt while Stiles watched in fascination. A throbbing itch settled uncomfortably in his stomach; he wasn’t done healing himself yet, but being able to bring Stiles a little relief after all he had been through for Derek’s sake was worth it. The more Derek took, the more the strain bled out of Stiles’ muscles, until he sagged against the back of the couch, his eyes heavy. Derek lifted his fingers from Stiles’ throat and laid his hand gently on Stiles’ knee. “Better?”

“So much better.” Stiles’ eyes drifted closed and opened even more slowly. “Does Scott know he can do that?”

“Probably not,” Derek admitted.

“We should tell him,” he said, yawning. “Everyone around the squishy human should know how to do that. Besides, it would come in handy after lacrosse practice.”

Derek just pulled Stiles close to him, arranging them carefully so that Stiles was lying half on top of him, safely ensconced between Derek’s body and the back of the couch. “Sleep,” he ordered gruffly. “We’ll talk about Scott’s werewolf lessons in the morning.”

“And what to do about Peter,” Stiles insisted, but his eyes were already closed again, his breathing slowing, taking on a calm, even cadence. 

“And what to do about Peter,” Derek promised, resting his cheek on the top of Stiles’ head.

“And when there can be more supernova Stiles-and-werewolf sex?”

Derek chuckled lightly. “Stiles, go to sleep. There’s plenty of time for that.” 

They had all the time in the world. 

With his mate wrapped securely in his arms, the scent of freedom and safety and _forever_ filling his lungs with every breath, Derek allowed himself to drift off to sleep.

FIN


End file.
